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deceptive non-service in the WWII camouflage corps

G. Burr Inwood, cartoon from Life, 1917.

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Lee Hall, Wallace Herndon Smith: paintings. University of Washington Press, 1987, pp. 60 and 64—

On Sunday, December 7, 1941, the Smiths were entertaining friends at lunch in their comfortable home in the country. A neighbor who had not been included in the party rushed in shouting, “Turn on the radio, turn on the radio.” Conversation stopped and while the guests tried to make sense of the neighbor’s urgent cries, he added, “They’re bombing us.” The Smiths and their guests, knowing the interloper’s proclivities for alcohol, assumed that he was well under the influence. When the message bearer dived under the piano, still wailing, they were prepared to dismiss his cries as an inept joke among joking neighbors. Soon, however, they were persuaded to tune in the radio and, with millions of other Americans, they learned of Pearl Harbor.

Talk of war—of Hitler and Europe, of England and of the United States’ loyalties—hummed in Connecticut as elsewhere. But even so, the news of the Japanese attack staggered the revellers. The next morning Wally telephoned a friend from Princeton who lived in Washington and who, to Wally's vague recollection, worked for the government. Through this friend, Wally managed to make an appointment with yet another friend who, he believed, "was handing out commissions." He flew to Washington and returned to Connecticut as a captain in the Camouflage Corps. “I was given a costume [a uniform],” he said, “but I never wore it.”…

The Camouflage Corps, to which Wally had been assigned as a commissioned officer, was by this time stationed in Missouri. Captain Smith was not called up to serve, but he chose nonetheless to mingle from time to time with his fellow officers. “The Camouflage Corps,” according to Kelse [Smith, his wife], “was a joke. They fought the war in the bars of the Chase and Park Plaza hotels.” 

restaurant robbery and a camouflaged futurist coffin

Above Anon, cartoon from The Sketch (London), 1919.

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REDSKINS GET $1,000 LOOT. Brooklyn Gunmen Paint Faces Then Stage Holdup. East Liverpool Review. East Liverpool OH, July 16, 1928, p. 8—

NEW YORK, July I6—Chicago gun­men may claim the distinction of hav­ing first introduced the submachine gun into the hold-up “racket,” but to Brooklyn goes credit for the first use of camouflage by stick up men. Three bandits today entered a State Street restaurant with their faces dis­guised with paint used in a manner like that employed formerly only by Indians on the warpath. The paint was streaked over their faces in [a] weird pattern. The leader wore a heavy black hue under one eye, while the rest of his face was streaked a brilliant red. The proprietor and his staff were so astonished that the bandits es­caped with $1,000 in cash and jewelry before an alarm was raised.

Nichols brothers / NY ship camoufleurs during WWI

Hobart Nichols

Above We have met [Henry] Hobart Nichols Jr. (1869-1962) before, when in 2019 we mentioned him in a post in reference to his service as a civilian camouflage artist during World War I.

His brother (pictured below) was also an accomplished artist, Spencer Baird Nichols (1875-1950). Both resided in Lawrence Park, an artists’ colony near Bronxville NY. His brother was also a civilian ship camoufleur, both of them being affiliated with the Marine Camoufleurs of the US Shipping Board, Second District, a section that was headed by William Andrew MacKay.

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MR. HOBART NICHOLS TALKS TO NONDESCRIPT CLUB
Bronxville Review (Bronxville NY) April 11, 1919, p. 1—

Mr. Hobart Nichols [American illustrator and landscape painter] of this village talked most entertainingly to the ladies of the Nondescript Club, at the regular weekly meeting on Tuesday, on the subject of camouflage. Mr. Nichols was connected with the camouflage department of the United States Navy. He illustrated his remarks by drawings of his own, and by various miniature camouflaged ships. He made it quite clear how the effects produced render good aim at a camouflaged vessel most impossible. The remarkable showing of less than one per cent of ships sunk, demonstrated the value of the work.

Spencer Nichols

 

correction of misattribution of magazine cover image

So at last the mystery has been solved. In September 2017, we blogged about an illustration of a dazzle-camouflaged ship that was published on the cover of the December 1918 issue of Sunset: The Pacific Monthly. It's quite a stunning image, and the magazine lists the artist as Harold von Schmidt, which we at first accepted as fact. But we began to have second thoughts, because if you look closely at the lower left corner, the artist has signed the painting as "Bull," not "von Schmidt." So, in the earlier post, we listed the names of both artists. 

As of yesterday, we have resolved the misattribution. The magazine was in error when it listed Von Schmidt as the artist. Instead it was the work of Charles Livingston Bull (1874-1932). In the process of reading the text of a von Schmidt exhibition catalog (John M. Carroll, Von Schmidt: The Complete Illustrator. Fort Collins CO: Old Army Press, 1973), we ran across the following note—

"Sunset Magazine December 1918, Cover: 'His Imperial Majesty's Peace Ship Camouflage!' (This picture is in dispute. Although the artist claims he did not do the painting, the magazine issue gives him credit for having done it.)"

Peanut Prieto selects a Chandler Coupe closed car

Humorist Kayem Grier (1920)

Above We recently found a photograph of a popular newspaper columnist (and erstwhile stage comedian) who was well-known shortly after World War I, at a time when it was still permissible to lampoon emigrant accents. His name was Kenneth M. Grier, but his pen name was Kayem Grier. He wrote a syndicated column, featured in various national newspapers, titled Peanut Prieto, in which (like Chico Marx) he mimicked the errors and accent of an Italian emigrant. Published below is the text of one of his columns, in which he talks about wartime camouflage in relation to (as might be expected) the use of cosmetics by women.

According to the news story accompanying the photograph, the Salt Lake City native was “not only a humorous writer. He is one of the most experienced motorists in the state…[Earlier] he became widely known to thousands of followers of the auto racing game throughout the middle west. In 1914, he toured the middle west with a racing car, driving half-mile tracks and thrilling thousands of visitors at state and county fairs in a series of sensational races. In the process, he was the owner of twenty-nine different kinds of cars. The article announces that he had selected a Chandler coupe “as his ultimate choice of an automobile.” The photograph was published in the Deseret News (Salt Lake City UT), May 29, 1920, p. iv., with the headline Peanut Pietro Selects Chandler Closed Car.

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Kayem Grier [Kenneth M. Grier], PEANUT PIETRO, in Irvingville Gazette, November 19, 1920—

Other day I toll thy boss bouta somating wot I tink. And he say to me you no better speaka dat way out loud eef you lika to stay een deesa place longa time. He say, "Eet you roasta ladies, Pietro, ees alla same keeka dirt on your own grave."

But wot he tella me ees no scare ver mooch. Eef I lika somating I like plenta mooch and eef I no lika I gotta deesgust. So I speaka wot I tink eef ees breaka my neck, I no care. When da war broka out somebody eenvent camouflage for maka every ting looka wot aint. Weeth da camouflage one ship ees looka lika two ship and two ship looka lika no ship. Weeth plenta paint everyting ees made for looka deefrence—jusa for foola other guy.

And now when da war ees queet some da women keepa right on do sama ting. I see one woman other day weeth so moocha paint on could foola U-boat. Eef we use so' moocha black powder on da Germans as women use white powder on da face mebbe we gotta heem licked long time ago.

Seema lika only ting some cheecken do now ees scrubba da nose white, paint da cheek peenk, maka red lips and putta google een da eye weeth black stick. Lika data way da face stick out lika sore thumb. And when ees come on da street she maka more noise as da dire engine.

One girl tella me she jusa putta nough on for stoppa da shine. She gotta so mooch on I feegure mebbe she tink her face ees headlight, dunno. Longa time ago I reada some place dat da pen ees stronga like da sword, or somating. For way some da women looka now I feegare da powder puff ees greater as da wash rog. But dunno—

Wot you tink?

is crime not to be depended upon / who can we trust?

Above A pictorial advertisement for a Victorian-era British illusionist, T[homas] Elder Hearn.

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Alas! This is An Age of Ingenious Camouflage, in Salina Journal (Salina KS), January 17, 1920—

New York—This is an age of camouflage. Yes; of course the word has been overworked. Maybe it isn't used any more in our best journalistic circles. But it's an age of camouflage just the same. Now take the case of John Smith of the East end, up for examination in a case of assault and battery. He did not deny that Emil Emilson hired him to beat up Joe Lansky or that he got $5 from Emil for beating up Joe. But he strongly denied that he did beat up Joe. Finally they got the truth out of John, who thus explained the seeming inconsistencies of his statement:

“When a fellow is hired to do up another guy he goes and tells him about it. Then they get together and they stick court plaster all over the guy's face and tie a bandage around his head with a little beef blood showing through and put his arm in a sling. The guy who wants him done up looks him over and thinks he got his money's worth.”

Now this is art, but is it honest? Is crime not to be depended upon to be what it seems? We know that our leather chairs are not made of hide, but of old rubber boots and condensed milk. We know that chicken salad is frequently made of veal. We understand that our sealskin coats are made from the fur of the muskrat and that our linen is cotton. Knowing, nobody cares. But it had been supposed that crime was above substitution. Here we have a detailed description of camouflage assault.

When thugs become too ingenious to kick in the ribs of the persons they are paid to assault and resort to camouflage to make the patron think he is getting something just as good, whither are we drifting? 

Camouflage Cartoons Archive online at ScholarWorks

Online Camouflage Cartoons Archive

How wonderful! I couldn’t be more pleased with the latest efforts of the ScholarWorks staff at the University of Northern Iowa’s Rod Library. For decades, while I was researching the subject of art and camouflage (both zoological and military), I also gradually built up a collection of camouflage-themed cartoons, especially those that date from before, during and after World War I. Because of concurrent events at the time, the cartoons sometimes also comment on the Armory Show, Women’s Suffrage, and Prohibition. The Rod Library has now posted this collection online as a Camouflage Cartoons Archive. My own particular favorites are those of Maurice Ketten.